Jeremy Chardy and Lukasz Kubot lifted their first ATP World Tour team title on Sunday at the MercedesCup in Stuttgart.

In a match heavily affected by rain, the French-Polish team defeated fourth seeds Michal Mertinak and Andre Sa 6-1, 6-3 in 68 minutes.

After a delayed start, Chardy and Kubot lost just six points on their serve in the first set. The pair led 6-1, 4-3 after 58 minutes of play, when rain suspended play at 2:15 p.m. local time. After a 25-minute delay, the match resumed.

Said Kubot, "It was a very good week for us. We made the final in Bucharest and now we have won the title. I think we can be a very dangerous team, especially on clay. To be honest, the conditions today suited us. It helped us to hit heavily from the baseline. I think we played very solid today - maybe our best match of the tournament. Match to match we played better and better."

"I think we played very aggressively," said Chardy. "All week we played very solid. We played one of our best matches together today, so it was good it happened in the final. It was difficult with the rain, but we returned to the court and Lukasz was solid on his serve to win."

Chardy and Kubot were finalists at the BRD Nastase Tiriac Trophy in Bucharest in April. Chardy is now 2-4 in ATP World Tour doubles final, while Kubot improves to 7-7.

"I am very happy to win the doubles title with my friend Lukasz," said Chardy. "We played have played two finals and won one title. I think we are a good team and very good friends. I hope we will play more times together."

Mertinak and Sa, who are 14-9 overall this season, were appearing in their fourth ATP World Tour final of the year.

They also finished as runners up at the Copa Claro in Buenos Aires (l. to Marrero-Verdasco), the Brasil Open 2012 in Sao Paulo (l. to Butorac-Soares) and the Delray Beach International Tennis Championships (l. to Fleming-Hutchins). Mertinak is 12-9 and Sa 7-15 in career doubles finals.

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Top seed Janko Tipsarevic captured his first ATP World Tour clay-court title on Sunday with a hard-fought 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 victory over second seed Juan Monaco of Argentina at the MercedesCup in Stuttgart.

Tipsarevic was presented a cheque for €64,700 and earned 250 South African Airways ATP Ranking points, while Monaco took home €34,080 and 150 points. It was the pair’s fourth meeting (2-2 overall).

Both players exchanged early service breaks, before Tipsarevic broke Monaco for a second time in the ninth game en route to wrapping up the first set in 51 minutes.

Tipsarevic looked set to win his third ATP World Tour title after he dropped only two of his service points to move into a 4-0 second-set lead. But Monaco won five straight games to rattle the 28-year-old Serbian. At 5-6, Tipsarevic fell to 0/30 but fought back to 30-all, only to see Monaco convert his first set point opportunity and ensure a tense finale.

The deciding set went with serve to 2-2, when Monaco hit his first double fault of the match on the second of Tipsarevic’s break point chances. After two hours and 21 minutes of play, with Tipsarevic serving at 3-2, 0/30, the final was suspended due to rain at 5:03 p.m. local time.

Upon the resumption, Monaco broke back for 3-3, but Tipsarevic ran through the next three games to record his 36th match win of the season with victory in two hours and 36 minutes.

It was the first time the top two seeds in Stuttgart had reached the final since 1996, when Thomas Muster beat Yevgeny Kafelnikov.

With victory, World No. 8 Tipsarevic became the last member of the Top 10 to win a title this year. He is now 3-6 lifetime in ATP World Tour finals. In January, he lost to Milos Raonic in the Aircel Chennai Open title match.

Monaco, who dropped to 5-9 in tour-level finals, picked up two titles earlier this year at the VTR Open in Vina del Mar (d. Berlocq) and the US Men’s Clay Court Championship in Houston (d. Isner). He has a 26-10 season mark.

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Self-praise is for losers. Be a winner. Stand for something. Always have class, and be humble.